


The L Word

by Davechicken



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:28:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22514017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: Crowley can sense love.He just... wishes Aziraphale hadn't finally found someone to feel it towards.(He is also the world's biggest idiot.)
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 29
Kudos: 237





	The L Word

**Author's Note:**

  * For [robincain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/robincain/gifts).



Something changed. Sometime after the End that Wasn’t, and it was not welcome.

Well. It kind of was, in that - blast it all - Crowley actually _did_ want the accursed angel to be happy. It - it - it just mattered, okay? And it was more than just… you know. Someone you could actually open up a bottle of _grand cru_ with. Someone who you could talk to. Someone who shared your sense of humour and world-view. Someone who wasn’t going to up and die on you, and…

It just. It mattered. Alright? He mattered. ~~He always had.~~

And even though he’d been a total shit of a friend (who the HELL said you WEREN’T friends, after six thousand years? Shit friends, that’s who…) Crowley had (BLECH) forgiven him that. Kind of. He’d apologised him _self_. Even though he wasn’t entirely sure what he’d done wrong, he’d just - he’d just - he needed him to _not bloody die in the end of everything or **worse** go to Heaven _, okay?__

__And then it had looked like maybe things would be better. What with the coming back from being - from - _that_. And with the appearing discorporeally. And the turning his back on the other angels, and the bench, and the bus, and the bath, and the champagne and things._ _

__He’d - pretty much felt like, right, okay, this was it. This was the actual definition of what Heaven _really_ was, but of course it couldn’t last._ _

__How could it last? Even if he rejected Heaven, he still couldn’t actually accept _him_. Demon. Even retired, or disavowed, or - what did you call a demon who refused to do what Satan wanted? Was there some sub-level of evil for people who refused to do evil for evil’s sake, and did something altogether different because they had quite liked living on Earth with one ridiculously floofy angel? _ _

__So when he started feeling all those things… yeah. It._ _

__He still could. Always could. It didn’t go away. You didn’t suddenly become blind to certain stimulus, just because you fell. Maybe you no longer enjoyed it the same way, because it wasn’t - you know - the done thing. And it was stuff you weren’t allowed for yourself any more._ _

__But he could. Feel it. Or - rather - sense it._ _

__L…_ _

___Lllllll--_ _ _

__THAT._ _

__That. THING. The thing you - angels, rather, and apparently Humans - were supposed to feel._ _

__Llllllll-- oh for the love of-- hah. Exactly. For the love of LOVE._ _

__The angel._ _

__Was feeling it._ _

__No, that wasn’t right. He wasn’t just feeling it, he was in it. In love. He fucking radiated like a glow stick broken out on a ship in the middle of the ocean in the dark on a cloudy night and he _shone_ and - well… GLOWED. It was the word, and the best one, and damned if he was supposed to be more poetic about it. _ _

__The angel was all bright and effusive and bigger than he should be and haloed in disgustingly pure affection and appreciation and Crowley kept feeling it from further away every time he tried to get near the shop, until one day he just couldn’t handle it any more._ _

__And he sat in the car, his hands whiter than sun-bleached-bones. Curled tight over the steering wheel, feeling every molecule of the material push back as hard as he did. Physics, or something._ _

__Crowley should just swagger in and ignore it. Or… maybe find some way to sabotage it. Or… go after whoever it was that had dared to _steal_ his best friend, or…_ _

__But he was _happy_. And - and - _ _

__Oh, fucking, shitting, wank arse cocksucking _tax-collecting traffic-warden neighbourhood-watch-volunteering bucket-jangling youth minister of a--__ _

__He couldn’t._ _

__He couldn’t take that from him._ _

__Even if it meant he’d be miserable and jealous and snotty for the rest of eternity. If the angel was - if whoever this being was - if it made him happy, then… it…_ _

__Not that they’d be good enough for him. And maybe that would be the end of it. Maybe Aziraphale would be smart enough to realise they weren’t, and then he’d be sad for a while, and Crowley could help._ _

__(No. The angel would allow himself to be walked all over, like he’d let Heaven do, and Crowley would have to fucking sort the thing out and make the person be better, because… ugh. It was the _right_ thing to do. And then he’d end up helping his **rival** , and he had the whole next six thousand years planned out when--)_ _

__“Crowley?”_ _

__He jolted upright from his reverie, aware he’d bitten nearly through his tongue in his frustration._ _

__“Oh, hi angel,” he replied._ _

__It was supposed to sound suave. It sounded, instead, like someone had fitted speech to a mangle and expected it to win Best Actor. Unless all the other entrants weren’t white, it was unlikely to work._ _

__“Are - is everything okay?”_ _

__“Hmm? Yeah?”_ _

__“You’ve been… I mean, you were supposed to meet me at… Crowley?”_ _

__Shit. Shit, shit, shit._ _

__“It’s okay,” he croaked. “If you want to see them instead.”_ _

__“Adam and the others? Why would--”_ _

__“I meant, him, or her. Or whatever.”_ _

__“My dear, you’re not making any--”_ _

__“Look, shut up and let me retain _some_ shred of dignity, alright? I know about - whoever - and… and I’m… nghhh… I’m not going to say I’m _happy_... just…”_ _

__“Crowley?”_ _

__“Don’t - don’t **go** , please?”_ _

__Aziraphale was standing outside the car, his hands wringing, making the very kind of scene he always complained about being made. While Crowley fought the urge to voluntarily, spontaneously combust. Himself. Right now. Immolate, in a tower of shame and self-loathing._ _

__“Go… where? I - I came to see why you weren’t tooting your horn for our date? I - you aren’t making any sense. Did - do you - am _I_ going too fast?”_ _

__Crowley stared. And then stared some more. Aziraphale refused to stare, his eyes flitting everywhere as he wavered on his feet, plucking at his nails and his coat sleeves and the edges of the universe._ _

__“D-date?”_ _

__“...I… yes? Did I - we… I mean, we could just be f-friends if you-- I just assumed you were - and I really rather _liked_ the idea and had for some time even though I tried to discourage you but it was because I was worried it would mean your s-- I mean -- that Hell would find out and I would… lose you and I never meant to make you feel anything less than what I did but I was so-- Crowley?”_ _

__“You aren’t - there isn’t someone else?”_ _

__“...someone… _Crowley_! How could you - I’m - that isn’t - I am quite secure in my affections, even if not the expression of them - and I would _not_ find anyone who--”_ _

__He._ _

__The angel._ _

__The love was._ _

__Uhm._ _

__“G-get in,” he husked, swallowing past centuries - millennia - of frogs in his throat._ _

__“But you thought I--”_ _

__“ _Get **in** , angel_,” he said, louder, and with a growing terror that might, in fact, just be a love of his own. If it was possible. Which it might be. (And it was.)_ _

__Aziraphale flustered around to the other side of the car. And opened the door, and looked like he was about to weep._ _

__Crowley felt the pain, and he knew it was also love. And it was for him._ _

__For him._ _

__He reached over, and put his hand most certainly over the one that fussed at a knee, and peered over the rims of his glasses. Even though he might, maybe, just slightly be blurry around the eyes himself._ _

__“Is this our first date?” he asked._ _

__“Well, I don’t know,” Aziraphale confessed. “I could never quite tell if it counted if we never… you know.”_ _

__Said it._ _

__“Would you… like it to be?” Crowley asked, as the hand beneath his turned._ _

__“Will you stop insisting I’m - you know?”_ _

__“Yeah.”_ _

__“Why did you… how did I give you the impression that… that I…?”_ _

__Crowley squeezed the hand. Swallowed again. “Just. Didn’t think you could. You know.”_ _

__“Then I have made a terrible mistake,” Aziraphale wailed. “And I must rectif--”_ _

__Crowley kissed him. What he didn’t expect was just how _hard_ the angel would kiss him back._ _

__Thankfully, some minor miracle meant no one saw two ageless idiots trying to ignore a handbrake and trade tongues through the old glass. It was messy, and it was a little damp (from tears, as much as the mouth-work), but it was… good._ _

__They were late for their reservation, but when they finally turned up… their hands refused to part for more than a moment at a time._ _

__Crowley was absolutely not letting the angel go, now he had him._ _

__Not. Ever._ _

__The feeling of love was brighter than he’d ever felt it, and Crowley couldn’t believe it was all for him. But then, he couldn’t quite sense the echoing nova that burned the other way. Which was just as well, because it would have been _embarrassing_. And he couldn’t have that._ _


End file.
